We each take a breath. We each take a step back. We each feel a surge of nervousness shoot through our bodies. We each look about ourselves, at the faces similarly frightened. We each edge back a little more.

Steve Snere has emerged from the backstage area with a stepladder. He’s unfolded it, and is singing from its rungs. Now he’s inside it, shuffling about the stage with one microphone in his mouth and another in his tight pants. We’re sure something, probably that ladder, is about to forcefully enter the crowd. But These Arms Are Snakes’ hyperactive front man doesn’t once imply, nor implement, any hostility towards the front few rows of the assembled throng. Indeed, TAAS are probably the least macho, the least chest-thumpingly knuckle-headed, the least hard hardcore band on the planet.

What does hardcore even mean, now, anyway? Sure, These Arms Are Snakes have plenty of heritage, but the music they so masterfully conjure from a small Camden stage is many parallel dimensions away from the current perception of what is and isn’t hardcore. This isn’t even post-hardcore in any sort of accurate sense – it’s above and beyond the limited compositional craft of many a so-called intellectual collection of particularly rocking musical minds, a thousand leagues from the flood of sound-alike tech-metal clones raping These Arms Are Snakes’ own past, as well as that of Dillinger Escape Plan, or Refused. There aren’t all that many could-be-called-metal bands around that can pull off slide guitar during a heavy song without being bottled into a hasty retreat.

So, how do we summarise the soundscapes this quartet from across the sea create using what appears to be the very minimum of necessary equipment? We don’t. Yet.

Besides, we’re getting ahead of ourselves with talk of triumphant, set-topping ladder tectonics – before These Arms Are Snakes make an appearance, their merch stall loitering aside, a brace of entirely different rock outfits warm the Underworld stage up in violently disparate manners. First on at eight are Meet Me In St Louis (left), whose Minus The Bear-isms are well received by those in early enough to witness the Surrey quintet’s super-kinetic display of complex riffs and cascading melodies.

An entirely appropriate support act, considering their obvious adoration of the bands These Arms Are Snakes’ members used to be essential components of, MMISL’s sole failing this evening isn’t even their fault – the less-than-crisp sound system simply doesn’t suit their dominating intricacies, leaving ears ringing to an onslaught of unfocused polyrhythms and a-machine-couldn’t-do-better drum beats sadly stripped of their fidelity. The pre-set urge to dance is easily suppressed by this sludgy speaker output – it’s like spilling half a dozen different liquids, simultaneously soaking them up with the just one sponge and then expecting to see them again, unmixed, once they’re squeezed into six glasses. Not. Likely.

Still, with the ever-watchable Toby part-timing it as a vocalist – he spends half the band’s six-song set out of microphone reach, dancing and falling and clapping and spinning – MMISL are never dull despite the obstacle the venue presents. Perhaps their sound is simply too dense, too layered, for such insalubrious surroundings? Perhaps…

PRE, though, manage to cut through any unwanted cacophony through sheer by-numbers force – they clutch at our throats like a livelier Wives fronted by a tiny Japanese girl, one best suited to a life behind the drums rather than one spent spiralling wildly in front of said kit. Which is a fantastically accurate thing to say, actually, as it’s Akiko (right) from London two-piece Comanechi who fronts this five-piece. Her aggravated chirps distract attention away from her evening’s attire – the nightie tucked into knickers look is rarely rocked around these parts, y’see. To her right, former Seafood-er Kevin Hendrick picks and pounds at a bass – one of two on stage – while to our right a gangly guitar player scales the bass drum only to fall into the rest of his percussionist’s gear. There ends the set, a brief one that leaves us in two minds: excitable though their members are, PRE are rarely so combustive compositionally, but their amazing energy has us beaming broadly as sticks and skins are retrieved from where they were scattered. On another night, maybe, we’d have happily let them choke us. Tonight, our primal screams are smothered by a yearning for more than archaic punk rock.

With a new album – their second – not only in the bag/can/whatever but also pressed up with full artwork already, there must be a great temptation within the These Arms Are Snakes ranks to simply run through their freshest songs at this one-off date – the Seattle-based group are playing London between continental festival dates. Instead, though, they mix in prime cuts from their Oxeneers… debut, leaving a fair few attendees literally foaming at the mouth. ‘Big News’ and ‘Angela’s Secret’ should prompt mass moshing, but tonight’s crowd is, perhaps fortunately for DiS’s wedged-in photographer, a reserved bunch who limit their physical appreciation to a slight swaying and impassioned head-nodding. Although Snere (left) runs amuck on stage, and off it, his actions are never mirrored by those he screams blue murder at like the son of a possessed preacher man – there’s some intoxicant or other in his blood, for sure.

Of the new songs, ‘Horse Girl’ is the best received – it’s been available for streaming on Jade Tree’s website for a while now. A harder number than many that feature on Oxeneers, it’d be fair for us to assume Easter, its forthcoming parent album, is a more volatile, haphazard affair than its solidly-structured predecessor. A handful of previously unheard efforts later, it’s clear that These Arms Are Snakes have embraced a slow-motion, almost industrial approach to rock writing – ‘Subtle Body’, a six-minute piece than buzzes and burns while guitarist Ryan Frederiksen slides a finger up and down his fret, comes over like an alt-country standard force-remixed by the Digital Hardcore of 1999. Both vocalist and guitarist alike mess about with looped effects, while bassist Brian Cook tinkers with a flashing box of electrical tricks – trying to keep track of what is making this or that noise is a dizzying task.

Bringing the house down – thankfully not literally, despite Snere’s best attempts to punch through the ceiling from his perch – with ‘The Blue Rose’, These Arms Are Snakes ignore requests for a proper encore by swigging the last from their cans and suggesting we all go get drunk. We take a breath, take a step back, and decide to go home. The stinging ring in our ears is louder than the traffic on Chalk Farm Road.

And still we can’t find a neat pigeonhole into which to place These Arms Are Snakes’ ever-evolving prefix-something-suffix music. It’s an entirely unique beast, and one that, for all its friendliness, consistently sets each of our nervous systems alight.

Photos by Simon Menhinick